talk about Solomon Spalding and Sidney Rigdon, can ignore the
cross-posting from the MAD-house:
glenn_thigpen wrote:...
10. Would Sidney Rigdon or Solomon Spaulding have had the Nephites building a temple
in the new lands, in light of their knowledge of the Bible?
...
A good question. If we tabulate the instances in the Book of Mormon where an Israelite
temple is mentioned or alluded to, we can compare those locations in the text to Matt
Jockers' attribution of Spalding's word-print and Rigdon's word-print.
Beginning with that data alone, there are segments of the Book of Mormon text having to do with a
temple, which either Spalding or Rigdon (or both combined) might have written.
For example, in the 1830 Book of Mosiah we see references to Israelite temples on
pages 155-56, 159, 170, 178 and 194. The mention on page 159 is non-specific, but
on pages 155-56 we read about King Benjamin at the Zarahemla temple and on pages
170, 178 and 194 we read about King Limhi and King Noah associated with what appears
to be Nephi's temple, in the land of the Lehites' first inheritance.
Jockers attributes authorship of 155-56 to Oliver Cowdery (although I'm skeptical)
He attributes authorship of 170, 178 and 194 to Spalding (which I agree with)
So, in the case of Mosiah, we have no instances where the story element of a temple
is attributable to Sidney Rigdon. If Rigdon was the compiler of the book, then the
most we can say is that he allowed those references to an Israelite temple in the
Americas to remain in the text, before he handed it over to Joseph Smith and Cowdery.
Would Solomon Spalding have placed an Israelite temple in the Americas? That is perhaps
the first question we should ask -- and questions about Rigdon can follow later.
In his Roman story, Spalding introduces the biblical religion into preColumbian
America (on the eastern shores of what later became the USA) and there has his
Roman colonists build a church for the worship of the same God who spoke to them
by revelation during their voyage from Europe to America. So we know that Spalding
had some interest in manifestations of the biblical religion in preColumbian
America, and that he was open to at least the basic idea of practitioners of that
biblical religion erecting sacred structures in ancient America for worship, etc.
Spalding probably borrowed this idea of preColumbian biblical religion from the
writings of Clavigero -- who speculated that the Christian religion had been
practiced in preColumbian America, based upon the discovery of ancient crosses
and Indian legends explicable by theorizing an apostolic visit to America.
We know that Spalding's contemporary, the Rev. Ethan Smith, took Clavigero's
speculations regarding preColumbian biblical religion seriously, since Ethan
theorized that perhaps Moses himself had brought that religion to the Americas.
A few years later Lord Kingsborough went so far as to attribute the legends
cited by Clavigerio, to a visit by Jesus Christ (or one of his apostles) to America.
We also know that Solomon Spalding was remembered as having written fiction
in which he reportedly brought Israelites to preColumbian America. The Mormon elder
Erastus Rudd knew Solomon Spalding, had knowledge of his writings, and recalled
that Spalding "had written a romance on a few mounds... pretending that the
ten tribes crossed from the eastern hemisphere via the Behring Straits to this
continent, and that said mounds were built by a portion of them, to bury the dead
after some hard fighting." By this recollection (and others) we learn that Spalding
had an interest in Israelites having migrated to the Americas in ancient times,
much the same as did Ethan Smith (see his 1823-25 "View of the Hebrews").
But none of the above information answers the question of whether or not Solomon
Spalding would have depicted his migrating Israelites as having built a temple
in ancient America, somewhat similar to his having the migrating Romans building
a church -- In fact, various associates of Spalding's recalled that the story
he displayed in Ohio in 1811-12, did not depict the migrating Israelites as being
practitioners of the orthodox biblical religion. Elder Erastus Rudd reported:
"The novel, as I was told by those who heard it read, referred to them as idolaters
and not otherwise religious."
This description, relayed by Rudd and others familiar with the story Spalding had
written in Ohio, is consistent with the Bible's depiction of the northern tribes
as being heterodox -- as not adhering to the orthodox Yahwistic religion of Judah.
Only as late as the reign of King Josiah were the remnant of these northern tribes
brought under the orthodox religion centered in Jerusalem. The Assyrians had
already carried off much of the population, when they allowed Josiah to impose
Jerusalem's religion upon the northern tribes. To seal this conversion, Josiah
advertised a Great Passover at Jerusalem, to which the converted northerners were
also invited. Since Spalding's associates recalled his bringing the migrating
Israelites to America "from Jerusalem," Josiah's reign and the time of his
Great Passover, would have been the appropriate time for the departure of Spalding's
"ten tribes" Israelites, away from Jerusalem and Josiah's imposition of religion.
Josiah said that the only valid temple was at Jerusalem.
Spalding's migrating northern Israelites were thus free to build whatever sacred
structures they desired -- since they were not under Josiah's control. But, if
those migrants were "idolaters," then thier religion would have been something
different from that practiced in Jerusalem -- perhaps something similar to the
religion(s) allowed into the temple during the reign of King Manasseh of Judah.
If Solomon Spalding had been familiar with Celadon's 1785 "The Golden Age," he
would have known that America was predicted to be a home for Israelites and
their "magnificent city, which may fitly named the New-Jerusalem." M. M. Noah
laid the corner-stone for a temple of this "New Jerusalem" on Grand Island, NY
in 1824. But such a development was in direct contrast to Ethan Smith's wanting
to gather America's Israelites (the Indians, he said) and send them to the old
Jerusalem, to gather there and build a millennial temple.
So, which of these two scenarios would have most appealed to Solomon Spalding?
Depicting an Israelite temple in America -- or gathering the Israelites to the
old Jerusalem in Palestine?
The whole question boils down to what fate Solomon Spalding envisioned for
the migrating Israelites reported by LDS Elder Erastus Rudd. Were those
"idolaters" supposed to re-discover the true biblical religion, and become
faithful worshipers of The Lord? If so, then Spalding evidently had not
evolved his account of their American experiences that far, while he yet
resided in Ohio and was working on his story there. If Spalding evolved
his migrating Israelites into faithful follower's of Israel's God, then
he must have done so after he left Ohio, in 1812.
But the Spalding account recalled by Erastus Rudd is not the story told
in 1st Nephi -- where Nephi actually builds an Israelite temple. And that
is precisely why Rudd remained a Mormon: because his knowledge of Spalding's
Israelite account DID NOT MATCH that of the temple-building Nephi in the
Book of Mormon.
So --- could Solomon Spalding have added temple-building to his Israelite
account? If so, then only in this way:
1. After he left Ohio, in 1812, as an addition to his Israelite story
2. By having his Israelites build a temple in direct conflict with Josiah's religion
3. By having that temple destroyed, or lost, so that it was not discovered later
Uncle Dale